Mouche’s adventures with her first mortgage (while coping with her first baby)

tootoo

I mouche, hope you are doing ok?

mouche

So kind of you to ask tootoo…I’m okay now though had a rough few days with the flu which finally arrived! LO also decided to turn on the terrible two’s full blast over the weekend so I basically spent Monday and Tuesday in bed recovering from both.

It just feels like I put him to bed on Friday my own sweet boy and he woke up on Saturday, a little monster! I’ve asked at the nursery and also my friend who’s LO is a year older and I think I need to start being much stricter and more consistent with LO. They do timeouts at nursery so I need to do them consistently at home as well. They should offer all parents of two year olds free shots of patience on the NHS, don’t you think? I could certainly use a top-up!

Anyway, on to money-stuff. Not a lot to report. Very low spend weekend as all we needed were fruit, bread etc. Plus, OH picked up a pack of stewing lamb from local butcher. Didn’t go out this weekend as I was feeling poorly on Saturday. OH came back from LOs football class on Sunday absolutely fuming at LOS behaviour. He always plays up a little there but apparently he was really bad – wouldn’t play, wouldn’t take turns, rolled around on the floor when it was time to go home. OH has said if he keeps it up, he won’t take him anymore. Oh dear.

Sold a pot of cream on ebay. But after fees and PayPal fees, the profit is about 40p. Oh well, it’s 40p I didn’t have before I guess. Oh oh oh…..the big news is that OnePoll has paid out - on the 27th day! I’m already up to £22 again so am well pleased I didn’t give up. The entire £40 has gone into savings for private school. Also up to £40.50 on YouGov so £9.50 left to go there.

Have had a nice relaxing few days ignoring the chores and managed to watch two of my favourite TV shows – Young Montalbano and Isabel – both subtitled so need my full concentration. Which is why I don’t get to watch them as I’m usually doing something else at the same time. Isabel has been recorded for months and I’ve only just seen the first episode. It was excellent so am going to make time for the rest.

My boss has confirmed that there will be a pay rise in the March pay packet though we won’t know how much till mid-March. He did warn it wouldn’t be much but I guess it’s better than nothing. Looking forward to it.

Hurdler

Hey mouche - it's been a while since I was around... hope LO calms down soon

kirstypark

don't worry about the toddler stage - it only lasts till they go to school and then they become quite nice for about 2 years before entering the prehormone stage when they are awful again. The hormone stage is dreadful, but there is approximately 6 weeks when they are wonderful again before they leave school and then stop talking all together. And get a woman who you will hate...

Voice of experiance, me - anything else you need to know?

mouche

Thank you Hurdler – I am told all toddlers go through this phase. Hope it’s a short one in LOs case!

Kirsty, thank you for stopping by – your words fill me with dread but I can hear the voice of experience speaking! Love the bit about bringing home a woman you don’t like. My nephew is almost 16 and almost all his FB updates feature a young lady about whom I can just imagine what my sister thinks!

Well, yesterday was okay. I started my new plan of being stricter and more consistent with LO. There were a few tears but things went really well till bedtime. After brushing his teeth, he decided to flush the toilet, which I let him do a few times and then asked him to stop. He wouldn’t so I carried him physically from the bathroom and he started screaming… and screaming….and SCREAMING – until he was sick all over both of us. Lovely. He also woke up in the middle of the night and screamed for an hour or so (wanting to go downstairs to play) before falling asleep next to me. So you will understand why I am not looking forward to this evening.

I guess all I can do is stick to it and hope he improves – I know he will but school-age is so long away Kirsty!

I really miss having OH around to help. Not that he deals with it any better than me but at least I have a support structure when he’s there. But I haven’t seen him since Tuesday and I doubt I will before Saturday – and even then he’s working Saturday and Sunday afternoon/ evening (so far, it could be all day). Dear readers, please do not let your children marry chefs until you’ve sent them over to me for a chat!

This is turning into an LO diary not an MSE one so let me see if I can dredge up some money news. Ermmm. OH posted my face cream today. I’ve bought a copy of Taming your Toddler off ebay for £2.25. And I’ve made a few more pennies on ebay. That’s about it. Hope you all have a nice evening!

mouche

Have realised this has been a very moany diary of late so thought I'd give you an LO moment from yesterday. When I went to pick him up from nursery, his key worker asked him, 'Tell mummy what we saw in the garden today.' LO beamed and said 'Biscuits!' Apparently they had a picnic in the garden and then saw a worm for the first time. Guess which of those memories stuck in his head.

tootoo

Hi mouche - re: lo its just a stage so it will pass. unfortunately another phase will always be around the corner, but it keeps us on our toes!!
Consistency I feel is always the key. DD1 is older so I count to 3 and 99% of the time it works.
We were worm watching the other day, I did stop her at picking it up though!!

gallygirl

tootoo wrote: »

Hi mouche - re: lo its just a stage so it will pass. unfortunately another phase will always be around the corner, but it keeps us on our toes!!
Consistency I feel is always the key. DD1 is older so I count to 3 and 99% of the time it works.
We were worm watching the other day, I did stop her at picking it up though!!

I liked worms. I filled a saucepan with them when I was little and put in back on the cupboard .

mouche

gallygirl wrote: »

I liked worms. I filled a saucepan with them when I was little and put in back on the cupboard .

I bet your mum just loved that!!! I won't be introducing LO to you any time soon.... :rotfl:

That said, I spent my early years in Africa and my nanny would feed me the local food which included fried centipedes of some variety. My mum's friends were horrified but my mum said 'she's healthy, she's happy and it doesn't hurt the African babies so why should it hurt mine?'

Not sure what I'd do if LO decided to chow down on a live one though. Fortunately he informed me later that 'no like wurrrrm. Yuk.'

mouche

Got called into nursery office yesterday as LO has been hitting and pinching adults and children and his key worker wanted to know if there had been any changes at home. She said they ahd been observing him and there doesn’t’ seem to be any triggers at nursery. Apart from LO missing OH in the evenings, there hasn’t been anything at home so we agreed to keep an eye on him and keep each other informed. She said it might just be the twos kicking in but it was so out of character for him and has come on so suddenly that they wondered if something was wrong.

I guess there is nothing to do but to continue to let him know when his behaviour is unacceptable and be consistent and firm with doing that. Thank you tootoo, pbr and everyone else who has commented with your own experiences – one part of me knows it’s just a phase and will pass and another part still has that dread of being ‘called into the teacher’s office’. I was an ultra-good boring child myself so I don’t really know how to cope with a slightly naughtier one. According to all sources, OH was a holy terror as a child so I guess LO gets it from him.

LO was quite well-behaved in the evening after nursery and the counting to 3 and ignoring his screaming worked well on the two occasions he didn’t want to listen. Also, OH managed to get home just before bedtime and LO was so happy to see him – he wouldn’t let him out of his sight till he fell asleep.

Anyway, am feeling slightly more upbeat today and have therefore spent £3 on choc chip cookies

No other MSE news. Need to look at sorting out a new energy deal as ours expires in April. Also need to sort out a new mortgage deal now that interest rates are definitely going up soon. Plus have to pay for holiday, get new NatWest account operational. Aaaargh - I need to spend less time posting/ reading and more time doing MSE don’t I?!

Have a nice weekend all.